Transcripts For WBAL Today 20091028 : vimarsana.com

i do 22 more inspections than the government requires. and my fresh, all-natural chickens are never given any hormones or steroids. and no candy, gladys. (announcer) perdue. extra inspections. extraordinary chicken. we re back now with another hour of today on this wednesday morning. it s the 28th day of october 2009. sure, it is raining out there, but let me tell you that many of those people have been here for the duration of the program. some of them getting here at about 5:30, 6:00 in the morning. so, hats off to them. trying to show them some love, but we re not out there. we re in the warm confines of studio 1a. i m matt lauer along with ann curry and norah o donnell, who is helping out while natalie is on assignment. al is in chicago. we ll check with him in a second. coming up first of all, baseball fan? yes. yes? yeah. i m an avid red sox fan you are. you re red sox, so you re rooting against the yankees like all red sox fans? i m pro-phillies. yankee fan. we re hoping the weather clears for game one tonight. there s a chance it may not. we ll keep our fingers crossed. meanwhile, coming up, money 911. that s right. we ve once again brought together our panel of experts to answer you questions, from how to pay off your credit cards and your house. plus, the new york city marathon, a huge event here. i m not running in it, but one of the competitors will be matthew reid, and he is running his very first marathon. of course, his dad was the late actor christopher reeve. his stepmom who died from brain cancer. now matthew s running to help people deal with spinal cord injuries, and we ll meet him in a few minutes. pretty inspiring. awfully inspiring. then later on, four young men and women who are so good that we may be working for them today. the latest finalists in our kid reporter segment. first, let s get a check of the morning s top stories. ann s got that. all right, matt, i do. in fact, some very serious stories to begin with this morning. today has been a day of violence and chaos in two countries the u.s. is working to stabilize. taliban insurgents stormed the capital city killing at least 12 people, 6 united nations workers, 1 an american. rockets also landed on the grounds of a luxury hotel. the attack s part of rising violence now ahead of next month s runoff election in afghanistan. it comes a day after eight u.s. troops were killed last month, making this month the deadliest for americans since the war began. violence is also intensifying in pakistan, where a car bomb today in a crowded marketplace killed at least 91 people. more than 200 were wounded. u.s. and pakistani officials say the blast was timed to take place as secretary of state hillary clinton arrived in islamabad, and she condemned all the recent attacks as cowardly. federal health officials report a significant increase in supplies of the h1n1 swine flu vaccine with 22 million doses now available, up from 14 million last week. the white house has revealed that first daughters malia and sasha obama got their swine flu shots last week. both daughters are in a high-priority age group. the website also says that the president and first lady won t get their shots until the needs of all priority groups are met. the landmark san francisco oakland bay bridge was shut down indefinitely on tuesday. met metal parts fell onto the road deck, damaging a car and a small truck. the bridge typically handles 26,000 vehicles a day. parts of colorado and wyoming could get up to two feet of snow today. more than a foot fell on tuesday on parts of oregon and washington state. high winds rattled street signs and kicked up blinding clouds of dust tuesday in california s san joaquin valley. the gritty haze caused traffic accidents and triggered respiratory health alerts that extended to arizona and nevada. and now you are up to date at three minutes past the hour. now back to you two. unless you ve ever been in one of those dust storms, it s hard to imagine how horrible they can be. especially if you re driving. we hope the people out there are doing okay. let s swing it out to chicago. mr. roker s got a check of the weather in the windy city. go, al! that s right, not as windy as it is out west. in fact, this is part of a big storm system causing snow in the rockies that ann talked about, and the winds out west. in fact, as we look at the surface map, you ll see those windy conditions coming out. snow around the rockies, and that snow is going to really be falling. as you take a look, you can see from denver down into colorado springs, off to grand junction, the snow doesn t show up quite as well on the radar, but it is coming down. boulder, we saw earlier, live pictures. and some of these snowfall totals could come up to 18 inches of snow, as much as 2 inches in good morning. the weather should improve as we had through the day today. off and on may showers are likely this morning. mostly cloudy this afternoon but drive by the evening com that s your latest weather. ann? somebody call 911 it s time for today s money 911, when our panel of experts answers your financial questions. and they are, joining us this morning, jean chatzky, today s financial editor, david bach, author of finishrich.com and carmen wong ulrich, personal finance editor for cnbc, and norah is at dean & deluca with questions from the plaza. let s get right to it. let s do it. first off, a caller, marcy from johnstown, ohio, on the line. good morning, marci. what s your question? caller: good morning. my question is, we ve sold a small parcel of land and we plan to use the proceeds from that to pay down our credit card debt. it will cover approximately 60% of our debt, which is on seven different credit cards, and they all have similar interest rates. so, our question is really kind of three parts. should we pay off completely as many credit cards as we can, and will our credit limit be lowered because of that, or should we pay a percentage of all of our credit cards? and is there any advantage to waiting until the new credit card laws come into effect? okay, jean. okay. let s dispense with part three first. there is no advantage. so you want to get started with this. but my first question back at you is do you have an emergency cushion? do you have emergency savings that could tie you through six months? caller: yes. okay. all right, then it s very easy. you just take that money and you apply it to the credit cards that have the highest interest rates while paying the minimums on the rest. so, if that will cover two or three different credit cards that have high interest rates, pay those off and don t worry about the others. you ll work them off over time. will your balances get lowered? they might, because that s what the credit card companies are doing these days, but it shouldn t really hurt your credit score because you re paying off debt as they lower the limits. all right. marcie, thank you so much for your question, and thank you, jean. and we ve got mary in a video question in ann arbor, michigan. let s listen to her. i ve been struggling with retirement given recent market losses. i m not in dire straits, but i was hoping to retire in the next two to five years. in meeting with my financial planner, he suggested looking at variable annuities as a way to guarantee income during retirement. i also read a money magazine article that talked about fixed annuities and actually favored them over variables, and i m really confused. they used to get a bad rap, so i m interested in what your take is on annuities, and if you do favor them, what percent of your portfolio should be invested in them? david, can you help mary? yes. first of all, once you re sold an annuity, you want to know, what is the commission? what is the actual cost of this annuity going to be? and here s what happens. a lot of annuities run fixed or variable, have actually a commission of up to 10%. now, it s not up front. it s what s called a surrender fee. and so, it may take ten years for that commission to actually go away. so, i d start with how much is the deferred sales cost? what s the internal cost of the annuity, which can be as high as 2%. now the question is should you do fixed or variable? the reality is, it doesn t have to be one of the other. it s not vanilla or chocolate. you can get a variable annuity that has a fixed rate inside it, so you can have a fixed rate of like 4% or 5% right now and put a percentage of your money into mutual funds and that can be global funds, growth funds, tech funds, bond funds. so, you really can inside a variable annuity have everything. so, the question is what percentage she should put into annuities. you have to know this, you are locking the money up usually an average of ten years. the nice part of an annuity for retirement is you can get a fixed income stream. i would not be putting more than 25% of my money ever into an annuity basket. okay, that s helpful. let me pick this up. annuities are sold, like you said, so people need to realize that, that there is incentive for you to have an annuity. and the fees that you pay in commission, that takes your money right off the top. so there are many, many other ways to put your money to use. and i agree, don t put more than 20% of your money in it. it s usually off the top, deferred sales cost, but if you get out, you re hit with a commission. it s too expensive. we have a question across the street. norah, what did you find? hey, ann, guess what? i found twin sisters from utah. they ve been running this morning. jamie and tricia. you have a question. i am wondering, should i sell my silver or hang onto it? carmen, do you want to answer that? what s with me and the metal questions? every time i m here. i think it s a clue. you ve had it for about a year, right? yeah. and is this bullion or is this jexlwelry. yeah, first thing you said. it s not jewelry it s in a soup. they re heavy blocks of silver. wow. i m amaid mazed you have that, because it s usually jewelry or an etf, for example. here s the thing with commodities. we re in a recession and folks really flock to things they can touch and feel and have, and the price has really gone up quite a bit. now, the price is projected to continue to go up for a while, but here s the thing, whenever you buy something like this, like a commodity, i want you to hold onto it for a while. this is an investment. so, to buy it and sell it, you re trying to time things. listen, if you can sell it in the next year and it goes up another dollar or so an ounce, that s good for you. if you want to hold onto it for a while, understand you may have to hold onto it for another ten years or so before you see a return on it, but i would not go out and buy blocks of silver. instead, get an etf she s just asking you whether she should sell it it was my husband. it was my husband. oh, it was her husband s idea. oh, it s always the husband s fault! what? i think we should sell it, but if you believe we re going to have inflation in the next 10 years, 15 years and there are people who believe that we re going to have great inflation. yeah. holding silver, holding gold is a way to protect yourself. and again, 10% of your money. a small percentage of your portfolio. thank you so much, norah. now we have a question on skype, jeremy in chicago. jeremy, go. good morning, ann. my wife and i were married in august. we re in our mid-to late 30s and we re hoping to buy our first home in the next few months. we saved enough for a down payment of about 8% of our target price, but my wife s currently unemployed, so we re concerned about bmi and what type of mortgage rate we ll be able to get. i m not yet at my 401(k) match for this year [ inaudible ] are we better off maximizing my 401(k) or reducing that and putting that money toward our down payment? the difference will bring our payment up to about 10%. okay, thanks, jeremy. what do you think, jean? this is a perfect time to buy a house because prices are low. but the thing is, we don t expect prices to go sky high any time soon, and it sounds to me, jeremy, like you re kind of on the line, like you don t have a lot of savings, like this is your nut in terms of your savings and you re dealing with that 8% to 10%. you want to put 10% down on a house these days, and many mortgage lenders will actually require it. so, i would say go ahead and make sure you ve got the 10% before you go out and look. if you can max out your 401(k) contribution this year and every year, it s a really important thing to do. and also, once your wife finds another job, they will be able to look at both of your incomes in terms of the mortgage that you ll be able to qualify for. banks right now are not willing to let people slide based on previous income streams. so, you may have a difficult time for that reason as well. all right. jeremy, good luck with that. and we ve got norah let s see if she s found any more twins over there. only twins. no more twins, but another fun one here. prescilla from baton rouge, louisiana. you ve got a question. go ahead. yes, i do. what s the best way to research for a broker when it s my first time investing? ooh, that s a good question. david, do you want to take that one? that is a great question and it s a good time to be hiring a financial adviser or broker. the first thing, we recommend this, get a referral from someone you know that you trust that s doing well financially, that is working with an adviser that they like. and usually, i would tell you, ask your friends that have had an adviser for at least five years, ten years even better. a one-year track record isn t important. it s how they ve done over five or ten years. before you hire anyone, please listen to me carefully, go to the nasd website, nasd.com, and always put in the adviser s name and check to see if what he told you is true, meaning where he went to school, how long he s been in the business. everything shows up on the nasd website. and check for disclosures, because if there s been any complaints against a financial adviser formally, it will be on the disclosure page on the nasd.com website. all right. and if you don t feel comfortable talking to this person, it doesn t mean they re a bad adviser, but they are a bad adviser for you. all right. we want to thank everybody who s asked questions, norah and also david and jean and also carmen. thank you so much for helping us this morning. thank you, ann. thank you. still ahead this morning, real simple recipes you can whip up for your family in a flash. but also, next, christopher reeve s son matthew plans a run of a lifetime this weekend and he ll tell us how he hopes to change the lives of people dealing with paralysis. 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(announcer) new scott extra soft tissue. softness done right! it s perhaps the world s greatest road race. the ing new york city marathon spans all five boroughs of new york, and every year, 40,000 runners from around the globe take to the streets to run the 26.2-mile stretch. and matthew reeve is son of the late actor christopher reeve, and he will race this year as a member of team reeve. his goal is to raise funds and awareness for the dana and christopher reeve foundation. and matthew, good morning. you re a brave man. thanks jrvesi. i don t know that i could do it. it is interesting, because you said before that you think people that run marathons are completely nuts. so, why are you doing it? yeah. i might have to revise that statement. i used to live near the finish line and i d see people come in exhausted, practically collapse and said why would anyone put themselves through that and voluntarily run 26.2 miles? but now that i ve done the training and i m ready for sunday, i get it now, and i m actually never thought i d say this, but i m actually looking forward to it. good. and what s inspired you? well, it came down to basically finding out that far more people than previously imjin imjini imagined suffer from paralysis and spinal cord injury. and the foundation released a survey which coincided with the boston marathon, which our ceo ran. so that day, he could barely walk and he was like, you re doing this. and when i found out about the numbers and the people i might be able to help, i was determined to do it. that s really impressive. of course, you re running on behalf of your parents foundation, the christopher and dana reeve foundation. tell us about the work of the foundation. what s your goal? well, two goals. one is to find a cure for paralysis and specifically spinal cord injury, and we re making incredible advances in that, and some of our researchers are really making incredible progress. and we also look to improve the quality of life for people currently living with paralysis. your dad, of course, superman. what would he if he were alive today, what would he think of you rubbing this marathon? oh, god, i don t know. he would probably think i had been replaced by a clone. i wasn t even a runner in march of this year when i started the training, and let alone five years ago, but but that s why people who run marathons do it, and those who have friends who run marathons. the point, is people who are not runners become able to do a 26-mile race. i mean, it s fantastic! yep, i know. before i could barely run a block and now i m running the ing new york city marathon. yeah. it s been quite a journey, but it s been life-changing. i ve really enjoyed it. you, of course, are doing this all for the foundation. you re on the board of your parents foundation. is there any new research out there that can help cure paralysis? there is. the thing with spinal cord injury and paralysis is every injury s different, and it happened at different levels of the spine. but there has been incredible advances recently, specifically using activity-based recovery and electrical stimulation, which is something that my dad had started to do towards the end of his life, and has a lot of potential and it s a really, really exciting time in the field. well, congratulations. and of course, good luck on sunday and glad you guys are raising some money certainly for the foundation. very impressive. hopefully, it s not raining out. i don t think it will be. good. of course, you can catch the 40th annual ing new york city marathon this sunday. that s from 2:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. eastern right here on nbc. and still ahead, a special performance from the legendary singer carly simon, right here in our studio. but first, these messages. ask your doctor about treating with vesicare. doctor) (pipe woman) then you could treat yourself to a night out with fewer urges or a day with fewer leaks or a trip with fewer overactive bladder problems. (pipe doctor) once daily vesicare can help control your bladder muscle and is proven to reduce frequent, sudden urges and leaks day and night. if you have certain stomach or glaucoma problems, or trouble emptying your bladder, do not take vesicare. tell your doctor right away if you have a serious allergic reaction, severe abdominal pain, or become constipated for three or more days. vesicare may cause blurred vision so use caution while driving or doing unsafe tasks. common side effects are dry mouth, constipation, and indigestion. (pipe woman) so, you could treat yourself to more time with friends and family or more of whatever you like to do with fewer urges and leaks. ask your doctor today about taking care with vesicare. now your chase card let s you make your own payment plan for what you charge. introducing blueprint. blueprint s free and exclusively for chase customers. for a big purchase, there s split. it lets you decide how much. or how many months you want to pay. so you can be comfortable managing all of your large purchases. if having a plan matters, chase what matters. create your own blueprint at chase.com/blueprint. because we believe in creating cleaner energy that creates new jobs. being the number one manufacturer of wind turbines in america. and developing lower emission, fuel-efficient aircraft engines. ecomagination means growing the green economy by harnessing our most powerful resource- imagination. the american renewal is happening. right now. should we order panda blossom, panda moon. how about chinese at home with new wanchai ferry? you can make it in just 14 minutes mmmh, orange chicken. great. i didn t feel like going out anyway (announcer) wanchai ferry. restaurant quality chinese in your grocer s freezer new tylenol cold rapid release gels day and night release medicine fast to relieve painful coughs, congestion and sore throats. so you can feel better. town house toppers the only cracker with raised edges. to keep dip in its place. town house toppers part of the town house family. when it comes to toppings, we ve got the edge. town house toppers the only cracker with raised edges. to keep dip in its place. town house toppers part of the town house family. when it comes to toppings, we ve got the edge. so, there s a reason if you ve got kids in the house and you ve got a little time tonight, might want a little spending time with them, to get in front of a television, because there is, in fact, a movie that we all loved in the past, monsters versus aliens is coming back to the small screen. there is a special feature made for tv. the voices of original cast members reese witherspoon, seth rogen, keifer sutherland and many others. and monsters vs. aliens: mutant pumpkins from outer space, that sounds like al. maybe a little louder. a little bit louder. 8:00 eastern time and repeats a half hour later, only on nbc. ahead, easy favorites you can make in a jiffy. shed a little light. and stockpile a little candy. because when you add a little spirit, you stress a little less. find all your costumes, candy and decorations at walgreens. throw a halloween party with soda, four for $10, and pizza, two for $10. walgreens. there s a way to add a little spirit. don t get the recommended amounts of calcium and vitamin d? that s where their favorite cereals like trix and lucky charms can help. general mills big g is the only leading line of kid cereals that has both calcium and vitamin d in every box. check for this banner on the cereals they already love. like cinnamon toast crunch and cocoa puffs. help them get more of what they need with general mills kid cereals. live, local, latebreaking. this is wbal-tv 11 news today in baltimore. good morning. i am mindy basara. federal and the senators said that pilot error and weather forecasts and air traffic controllers in ability to use the control safely or all factors in the deadly medevac crash that killed four people. the pilot was up to speed and training requirements but not skilled in instrument landing. the ntsb is bidding said the recommendations, including king helicopters with the night vision goggles and a terrain awareness and warning system appeared police say they already implementing many of the recommendations. baltimore leaders are working on a first-of-its-kind legislation that would provide more clarity that pregnancy, the spirit it would require cedras to be straightforward about remedies pregnancy centers. it would require the centers to be straightforward about the services provided. supporters said it would protect one of the bait and switch advertising. it looks like the weather will be improving as we head into the afternoon. rainshowers already tapering off now. a little drizzle left behind. once we get into the afternoon. wants to get into the afternoon, it will be dry. if a little such it sneaks through the clouds of ocean city, they will make up to 71. seven-day forecast looks like this going into the weekend. quite conditions on thursday and friday. 68 on friday. chance for a few showers and thunderstorms on halloween. high temperatures near 72. it will be nice and mulford trigger treaters. we will have another update at 9:55. i was working in the lab late one night when my eyes beheld halloweens past. we ve had a lot of fun here humiliating ourselves on halloween, and this friday will be no exception. so, if you re in the area, please come on down and check us and all of the people out who will be dressing themselves up for the holiday, and we have prizes, as we usually do, for the best costumes. we get some great ones, so do come to compete. we re back here inside studio 1a. natalie s on assignment. al s in the windy city. let s just keep watching this, though, because it s pretty darn good. not that one, though. yes, that one. and this, of course let s watch this, because you know, everyone needs to see this again. those, of course, are matt lauer s legs yes, wow find something more. there you are. j. lo has arrived. and so has norah o donnell, joining us because al and natalie are off. it s so great to be here. of course, i love halloween. you love halloween. well, you can come and dress up. you can use my costume. first, coming up this half hour, we ll talk about a pretty serious and sweet story about a beautiful little boy who was 9 years old. his name was michael ludwig. he loved sports, he loved his family, but he died of a congenital heart defect that was not diagnosed, even though the parents took him to the doctors because there were symptoms. so, we ll be talking about this. his father is speaking out, hoping that other families won t have to go through the same heartbreak. so, they re turning their pain to try to help other people. we ll be hearing from them in a little bit. very important message. we re also going to take you to our kitchen. because if you re stumped by what to make for dinner every night as we always are. exactly. never fear. we have some easy recipes. that s the key word, easy recipes from real simple magazine, and why wasn t i this good back when i was young? we re going to unveil our pick for the youngest, best reporter, our kid reporter competition. of course, they ve all been so fantastic. i love that so many tapes were sent in. it s just great, but we re going to have our next finalist revealed. i know. it s pretty funny. i wish we had that opportunity when we were younger. yeah, that s true. who knows where we d be today? exactly. anyway. then later, carly simon will be singing for us. first, let s go back to chicago, where al roker has a check of the weather. al, looks pretty cold out there. where would you be, al? it s not so bad. but let me put it this way, it s not like you guys are chopped liver. um, hello. right. i think we re chopped liver. it s okay. anyway, chopped liver is good on a little toast, but that s a different story. let s check your weather and see what s happening, and we ll show you for today, we re basically looking at some clouds and showers in the northeast. the heavy rain moves out by this afternoon. sunshine through the southeast. strong snowstorms working their way through the rockies. heavy thunderstorms from texas on into oklahoma. and for trick-or-treat, not looking so good along the eastern seaboard. there is no treat there. rain up and down the coast. we re looking at showers and mountain snows in the pacific northwest. clear night in the southwest, also into the the weather should be improving as we head into the afternoon. rainshowers off and on through the morning hours. the time to get to the afternoon, it should be dry and and that s your latest weather. ann? you know, you look kind of cute there with your coat and your fall colors. you re digging me. yeah, i m digging you this morning. thanks a lot, al. coming up next, which one will rise to the top? we re talking about our semifinalists in our kid reporter competition. we re going to find out who you voted for. it puts his brain in the game. so while he s practicing his abc s and 1-2-3 s 9, 10. k ! he ll also be an mvp. circle ! seven ! new 3-in-1 smart sports, only from fisher price. and meet ella. with the new smart fit park, triangle ! she ll be playing and learning. 3, 4 ! now that s a real day at the park ! t. ! smart fit park, only from fisher price. simply wholesome ingredients and nothing more. announcer: there s a place called hidden valley. where kids not only eat their vegetables, they can t get enough. hidden valley ranch, makes vegetables delectable. now rediscover the delectable taste that can only come from hidden valley, the original ranch. to buy raisin bran extra! i m surprised nobody else is here for the big debut of the almonds. oh, guys, i can see it! they re setting it up right now! is it true? 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(to the tune of do your ears hang low? ) does your nose go to the do your side? t wide oes your elbow have a crinkle? do your knees sorta wrinkle? does your chest tend to freckle? do you have a crooked smile do your eyes. .sit wide? do your ears sorta wiggle? does your hair make you giggle? does your neck grow long? do your hips sing a song? do your ears hang low? vodove and walmart. find real beauty for less. all free clear 2x concentrated detergent. all free clear s powerful clean is free of the ingredients you ll find in most detergents: no perfumes. no dyes. no preservatives. free clear is specially designed for people with sensitive skin and has powerful stainlifters, so you can trust it to get the job done right. free clear is the number-one detergent recommended by dermatologists. so, for a pure clean, all free clear is all you need. announcer: today s kid reporter is brought to you by carnival cruise line. okay, everybody. this morning on today s kid reporter, it s time to announce our week three winner. our four semifinalists are diedra shores, a 12-year-old from memphis, tennessee, 10-year-old owen from altadena, california, jenna nicole ruiz from indiana and 12-year-old bailey brown from russell springs, kentucky. the competition, of course, very tough, and thousands of you voted for your favorite, and now it s time to reveal our next finalist. drum roll, please. and the winner is deidra shores from memphis, tennessee! that s right, deidra, that s true, yes! oh, i love you. it s you, yes! you won! you won! deidra, how are you feeling? how do you feel, deidra? i am so i m happy. i m very happy. we couldn t tell. no, it s real. we re not kidding. and in your tape, deidra, you did a report on where in the earth is matt lauer? and so, the key okay, i m just going to keep talking while you figure out how you can breathe, remembering how to breathe. okay, i m good. why does this mean so much to you, deidra? why are you so excited? because, well, i didn t even expect to make it into the semifinals. i had given up all hope, and then that was amazing for me, and this is i am so happy right now. this is great! well, we love that you did this where on the earth is matt lauer? sort of the take on that. if you could go anywhere in the world, where would you want to go to report on a news story? um, i would i would probably want to go somewhere like some type of jungle, tropics type of thing, you know, where some lions and monkeys and stuff. uh huh. so, you d like to maybe report on like the animal kingdom? yes. yes. and so, and so you re thinking about are you thinking this could be i mean, are you really thinking this could be the launch of your career as i mean, are you really seriously thinking about becoming maybe a reporter some day? well, being that i got to see behind the scenes what it s like here in memphis at our news station and the today show, i m just like, this is a really nice job. i m thinking about this. so, now that i made it to the finals, i think this is a great opportunity for me. well, you know, this job does not require any personality. and since you have none at all, it s probably perfect, a perfect match. what do you think? exactly. exactly. all right, deidra, you are so smart, obviously, and congratulations on such a great video and being part of the finalists. thank you. and deidra, have a nice day at school today. thank you. all right, okay. bye-bye. bye, dear. and by the wham, weak three down. deidra joins brodie myers and sammy isler as today s kid reporter finalists. and and next week we re going to meet four more hopefuls vying for this final spot in the finals. so, we re almost there. find out who s the best kid reporter. we re going to get down to the final four. the final four. first, we ll be right back with more after this. mm-mmm. new ship smell! 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(phone ring) good morning, scott tissue. can everyone hear me? uh, just barely. great, let s get started. surprise! you guys! (announcer) now scott extra soft tissue has a new design, and it s our softest ever. and one mega roll has more sheets than four of the competitions regular rolls. wow! this is really soft! new guy. (announcer) new scott extra soft tissue. softness done right! michael ludwig was an outgoing and caring 9-year-old boy who loved playing sports, especially baseball, but michael was born with a congenital heart defect that neither his parents nor his doctors knew about until it was too late. michael s father ed ludwig is honoring michael s memory by educating other families about these conditions. and dr. robert kazi is a pediatric cardiologist at the hackensack medical center in new jersey. good morning to both of you. thank you. let s talk about michael first. he loved to play sports. after he passed away, which was two years ago, thanksgiving, it was determined that he had this dangerous congenital heart defect. what were the symptoms that you saw? the symptoms were very intermittent. sometimes during sports he would have to put his head down and maybe take himself out of the basketball game. sometimes during sustained running, he would just have to stop and say he would have chest pain. but it was very bizarre in a way, because he could typically bounce back, even during the same game. he d be back 15 minutes later. so, we did have him tested for a number of things. we first thought he had asthma. my wife took him to numerous pulmonologists and cardiologists. after a while, asthma was ruled out, and then we had his heart checked out, and despite a battery of tests, they were unable to detect his condition. in fact, he had seen a cardiologist less than two weeks prior to his death. that s correct. so, there was a real effort to find out what was wrong with your son. dr. tazi, why did not the medical establishment find who was wrong with michael? there are limits to what medicine can do today and what we can identify. we re getting better at it. the equipment s getting better. and we re educating, and that s what we re here for, to educate not only the masses of people, but also the physicians to think about this. if you don t think about it you re not going to find it. you were not involved in the care of michael, but you re saying that the technology is getting better. so, let s try to help parents now use michael s experience to help parents out there to know what to do. the symptoms include chest pain upon exertion, fatigue, loss or near loss of consciousness. that sounds like a serious one. seizures, unexplained shortness of breath, dizziness, family history. those are the warning signs for sudden cardiac arrest. absolutely. there is family histories that are important. so, if you know of someone in the family who has died, that s an additional one that s very important. but of all of these, when you have symptoms, with exercise, you need to have that evaluated. and recurrent symptoms with exercise is probably the most important thing that you could do, because and if your doctor does not find something, as they didn t find in michael s case, what do you do? well, that s the tragedy of this. they were really pushing as parents would push for the best for their child and didn t know. but hopefully, with education, as we re doing now, not only will the parents be able to seek more opinions, but also, the physicians, hopefully, will be able to do a better job with new technology. of all the symptoms on this list, i m seeing the near loss, loss or near loss of consciousness. and when you have a child who is 9 and is experiencing that, i mean, it seems to me that all doctors should say maybe we shouldn t do sports. i mean, really absolutely. he was cleared for sports, but maybe that s something. i mean, i m not a doctor. is that wrong for me to say that? i think that that s the trigger to do further evaluations. there are children who have symptoms with sports, but before they are allowed to play again, they need to be looked at aggressively. and even the technicians we re training technicians to do a better job. there s new technologies that are coming out. your foundation has actually provided new equipment, thre three-dimensional ecocardiography for hospitals. that s adding to a better medical community. and we talked about your foundation. you re running the new york marathon this weekend to honor your son. it s 26-plus miles. what will you be thinking about? well, everybody running the marathon has their own sorry like matthew reeve running for his father. well, i m running in honor of my son. he had trouble with sustained running, and the marathon is probably the best example of sustained running. i ll be thinking about him a lot during the race, and it s been just terrific, the support from the community, our friends and family during the past two years. we actually have a friend who actually asked me if she could run in honor of michael, and it s so touching. wow. so, then, his love your love for him and his love for life and baseball live on. absolutely. go, go, go. nice to meet you, ed, and nice to meet you, too, doctor. thanks for having me. and if you want more information about michael s story and the michael ludwig foundation, you can find out all about it on our website at and we re back with today s kitchen and a hot chef who s here to help you get through dinner, a din were dilemma every night. real simple magazine s food director ellie lewis-klapp brought along recipes from the latest cookbook real simple: best recipes, easy, delicious meals. everybody loves that. easy, fast, delicious. that s how all the recipes in the cookbook are. what s on the menu today? we re making a chili with stuff you probably have in your pantry. start with some onions, carrots, peppers. this is stuff that you have at home. like a lot of the recipes in the magazine and in our new cookbook, it s stuff that you have in your pantry. it s fast to get together. some green peppers, or you can use peblano peppers. and you want to soften those up. but something like chili, you can make it ahead, you can reheat it. all that stuff. you can double it. now, this is ground beef. ground beef. why do you like this? i like ground chuck, which has a lit more fat in it. fat to me tastes great. you can use leaner ground beef or ground turkey, ground pork, whatever you like to do in your house. and you stir in the ground beef, a little tomato paste, which is going to give it a really nice, rich color. you want to brown that paste little bit. that s the secret to tomato paste is cook it until it s brown. that smells good already. and lots of veggies in here. absolutely. carrots and peppers. absolutely. once the beef gets brown, you re going to add some really healthy stuff, some black beans, which are great for you. tons of fiber. because you know our director, joe michael, he loves black beans. does he? then this is for him. yeah. so, some black beans, a little chili powder. beautiful. if you have chipotle chili powder, you can use that. spicy. some water. then let that simmer for 20 minutes. this is simple. this is a dump-and-stir, i like to call it. that s nice, and the beef to brown that takes? a couple minutes to brown up. vegetables take a couple minutes. then you end up with a beautiful, soupy stew, nice and thick, and you put in a little bit of corn, frozen corn, which you might have in your freezer. or you could use fresh corn. absolutely. not a lot of it this time of year, but this is perfect for a day like today. i love. it then we ve got one other quick recipe here that i just want to touch on. this is the bread pudding, which i m a huge fan of bread pudding with a scoop of ice cream. absolutely. explain how you make this. this is the best bred pudding ever, made from chunks of dark chocolate, custard, cream milk, a little sugar you! yes. no, no, it s mine! all mine! fantastic. ooh! this has got a lot of chocolate. mm-mmm. bring it down here. bring it down here. anything with chocolate is nice. nice and oozy. chocolate. dainty this is good for like a dinner party, because you can thank you. are we on air? basically, what you re talking about, this looks like low cream and eggs. these are low-fat, these quisants? let live, local, latebreaking. this is wbal-tv 11 news today in baltimore. good morning. i am mindy basara. and anne arundel county woman is in serious condition after being stabbed several times in the odenton area park. the 68-year-old victim was attacked by a man described as someone in his 30 s with a long beard. it happened tuesday morning at patuxent river park. the robber is suspected be a motive, but police said did not believe the suspect is a cut t it looks like the weather is going to improve as we head into the afternoon. rain showers gradually tapering off now. should be mostly cloudy later on today. evening commute will be better than the morning commute. quiet weather coming back on thursday and friday. we could use the break. 68 on friday. thank you for joining us. as you back here for 11 news at noon.